n. Fifty yards of open waste ground enables me to mount and ride into
the entrance of the principal street. I have precious little time to look
about me, and no opportunity to discover what the result of my temerity
would be after the people had recovered from their amazement, for hardly
have I gotten fairly into the street when I am met by my old guide,
conducting a guard of twelve soldiers who have been sent to bring me in.

CHAPTER X.

ARRESTED AT FURRAH.

Perhaps no stranger occurrence in the field of personal adventure in
Central Asia has happened for many a year than my entrance into Furrah on
a bicycle. Only those who know Afghanistan and the Afghans can fully
realize the ticklish character of this little piece of adventure.

My soldier-escort are fine-looking fellows, wearing the well-known red
jackets of the British Army, evidently the uniform of some sepoy
regiment. Forming around me, they conduct me through the gate of an inner
enclosure near by, and usher me into a small compound where Mahmoud
Yusuph Khan, the commander-in-chief of the garrison, is engaged in
holding a morning reception of his subordinate chiefs and officers. The
spectacle that greets my astonished eyes is a revelation indeed; the
whole compound is filled with soldiers wearing the regimentals of the
Anglo-Indian army. As I enter the compound and trundle the bicycle
between long files of soldiers toward Mahmoud Yusuph Khan and his
officers, five hundred pairs of eyes are fixed on me with intense
curiosity. These are Cabooli soldiers sent here to garrison Furrah, where
they will be handy to march to the relief of Herat, in case of
demonstrations against that city by the Russians. The tension over the
Penjdeh incident has not yet (April, 1886) wholly relaxed, and I feel
instinctively that I am suspected of being a Russian spy.

In the centre of the compound is a large bungalow, surrounded by a
slightly raised porch. Seated on a mat at one end of this is Mahmoud
Yusuph Khan, and ranged in two long rows down the porch are his chiefs
and officers. They are all seated cross-legged on a strip of carpet, and
attendants are serving them with tea in little porcelain cups. They are
the most martial-looking assembly of humans I ever set eyes on. They are
fairly bristling with quite serviceable looking weapons, besides many of
the highly ornamented, but less dangerous, "gewgaws of war" dear to the
heart of the brave but conservative warriors of